By Pradip Rodrigues
COLUMBIA, SC
People who meet Prabjot (PJ) Kaur Randhawa who lives and works in Charleston, South Carolina think her background is anything but Sikh. “When I tell them I am Canadian, born and raised in Winnipeg and my parents immigrated from India back in the mid-70s, they can scarcely believe it,” says PJ Randhawa. Growing up PJ Randhawa always wanted to be a broadcast journalist. She’s smart, ambitious and to use a phrase made 
even more popular by President Barrack Obama when he referred to California’s attorney general Kamala Harris as being ‘easy on the eyes’, Ms Randhawa pretty much fits that description. She went on to do her Masters in Journalism from DePaul University in 2011 and began pursuing her dream in the US of A. “I cover politics and crime, especially white collar crime. As far a s journalism goes, the US is far more exciting, Winnipeg feels a lot slower than even South Carolina,” she says. She worked at for ABC affiliate KOTA TV and is currently the morning new anchor in Columbia, SC where her news segments are broadcasted in South Dakota, Wyoming, Nebraska and Montana. She will as always be there with her camera. Quite often she’s a one-woman show. “I do my interviews, edit remotely with my computer and send off my segments.” Living and working in a South Carolina where she happens to share the same last name with its Governor Nikki Randhawa Haley invariably brings on the ‘are you related’, question. This happens more often when she is covering political events. “ I have to make it clear that we are not related. I guess it is because there are so few Sikhs in the state. PJ Randhawa knows many Sikh families who are quite taken aback when they realize she is Sikh to begin with and then they get even more puzzled when she tells them she’s single and a reporter. “It’s the same back in Winnipeg, many in the community do not understand what I do and why I do it and of course why I am not married,” she says. She keeps abreast with what is happening in national and state politics but also is up to speed with harmless politics within the community. There is one Gurdwara here and another is being built incidentally with funds committed by Governor Nikki Randhawa Haley’s family. I will be attending the inauguration.” Like her (last) namesake Governor Nikki Randhawa Haley, PJ Randhawa too has big ambitions and she’s only just getting started.